


Craigslist

by sirsparklepants



Series: Gig Economy AU [1]
Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Non-Magical, Gen, Gun Violence, everyone is allowed a modern au and this one is mine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-31
Updated: 2021-01-31
Packaged: 2021-03-17 09:22:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,524
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29097975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sirsparklepants/pseuds/sirsparklepants
Summary: Geralt walked into the bar just in time to watch his client take a half full solo cup to the face. Lucky for him, this wasn't a security gig, so he didn't have to do anything but settle in the corner by the stage.
Series: Gig Economy AU [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2134953
Kudos: 7





	Craigslist

**Author's Note:**

> Slightly cleaned up repost from Tumblr.

Geralt walked into the bar just in time to watch his client take a half full solo cup to the face. Lucky for him, this wasn't a security gig, so he didn't have to do anything but settle in the corner by the stage.

The whole crowd booed as the client sputtered, moving his guitar away from himself as the drink cascaded down his face. "Well!" the man said. "Glad I could bring you all together like this!"

A Smirnoff Ice bottle flew at the stage this time, and the man caught it, shoving it into the front pocket of his skinny jeans. "Guess my set is over," he muttered, and scanned the crowd.

Geralt moved from where he was slumped against the wall, letting his white hair catch the dim light from the bar. His client brightened a little as he saw him.

"Geralt, right?" he asked. Geralt didn't answer - they'd already exchanged names and photos, though he'd forgotten the client's name already. Good thing he didn't try, though, because the other man was off and running.

"I'm so glad you're here early! I certainly didn't expect this kind of reception. People seem to like my recordings just fine, so perhaps it's my stage presence. What did you think, Geralt, is it my stage presence? Am I threatening to the heterosexual men of the world? Come on, you can tell me. Three words or less."

Geralt grunted. "Wouldn't know," he said. When Jaskier tilted his head, he added, "Just got here. Let's get your shit before someone takes it."

"Ah, yes, an excellent suggestion," the client said. He led Geralt back to the stage - unnecessarily, as it was barely five steps away - and began to pack up his more delicate equipment. This close, Geralt could smell the distinct tang of Natty Light in his hair, and wrinkled his nose.

"Did you park by the side door or the main?" the client asked, when everything was ready to go.

"Side," Geralt said. "Want to stay here with the rest of it so no one takes off with it before I come back?" he asked, nodding at the other half of the music equipment.

"Oh, no need!" the client said, hefting up the heavy speaker Geralt was sure he'd be schlepping. "I do most of my own fetching and carrying. I can't get it all, but I can certainly get it out to your car. That's the thing I'm missing, really."

Geralt grunted and started for the side door instead of talking.

He'd pulled out his tarp and ratchet straps when he'd gotten the client's email, so once they'd settled the speakers and other things in, he wrapped them up and tied them down. They didn't take up too much room in the bed of his old Ford Ranger, but it was enough that he was glad to have moved his things behind his seat. When he finished, he saw the client standing awkwardly by the passenger door, and he wondered if he'd forgotten to unlock the door before he went into the dive bar the client had been performing in.

"Sorry, it's just - do you want me to go back in and ask for a towel or something?" the client asked, gesturing at his wet face and hair. "It's a bit sticky, and I don't think your seats would get the same benefit from a beer rinse as my hair."

Geralt shrugged. "She's seen worse," he said. "Get in."

Normally, with clients, he fished a tape out of the shoebox he kept shoved under the seat. The musicians tended to sing along, though, so he pushed the fake tape that let him play from his phone into the tape deck and let the Coast to Coast AM rerun he'd been listening to on the way over keep playing.

The client seemed to enjoy it, only speaking up to give directions. He was staying on the third floor of a run-down but not terrible apartment building, the kind that Geralt's brothers usually lived in when he saw them. The elevator was busted, so they had to haul everything up the stairs. Geralt was distinctly grateful this client did some of the work for himself.

When they had settled everything in the client's bedroom, Geralt turned to him. "Hundred orens, like you told me," he said.

The client bit his lip. "Well, you see, Geralt, my dear," he said, "I don't actually have a hundred orens." His hand settled on Geralt's arm, stroking up and down. Geralt suppressed the urge to flinch. "I was hoping we could settle up with an... alternative method of payment."

"I don't take bitcoin," Geralt said immediately. He'd had enough bad experiences with that.

The client laughed. "No, darling, I wouldn't do that to you! I'm suggesting something else entirely. My roommates are out for the night, after all. I put clean sheets on the bed. And I've been told I'm  _ quite _ talented."

Oh, that. Geralt considered it for a moment. His client was pretty, with big blue eyes, long legs, and strong hands. He'd get a night of sleep in a real bed, instead of in the bed of his truck, and a shower, too. But the gas gage was nearly at empty, and there was shit for work in this town. He needed gas to move on.

"We exchanged emails, that's a written contract," he said instead. "If you can't come up with the money, you're in breach of it." He was bullshitting and he knew it, but hopefully the client didn't.

The other man's face fell. "I really don't have the money," he said. "Didn't even get paid tonight."

Geralt scowled and bared his teeth at him. "Lot of expensive equipment in here for someone who doesn't have the money," he said.

"Brought it with me when I left home, was all!" the client said, a little nervous. "Wait, wait, okay, I have an idea how we can get the money, alright?"

"An idea?" Geralt asked.

"Yes, an idea," the client said. "There's this commune on the edge of town, no one has ever been inside, but they say they're hiding from the government so they don't have to pay taxes on the big country mansions inside. We can sneak in and steal something from them! Be our own Robin Hoods, right? You can stay with me to make sure I don't run off on you, and if that doesn't work, you can come to the pawn shop with me tomorrow. I'll sell… one of my amps to get the money I owe you, alright?"

It was a harebrained scheme, but at least the client had a backup plan. And in the likely case he chickened out, Geralt could still demand to sleep in his bed. "Alright," he said. "Let's go."

* * *

Just outside the Posada town limits, the terrain rose sharply, into what Geralt could barely call foothills. He coaxed Roach up as high as he dared, but when he had to hit the gas with one foot and the brake with the other to keep from sliding backwards at a stop sign, he admitted defeat, looking for the first part of the road wide and flat enough to hold his truck. The hill start would be tricky, but he’d deal with it.

“Have to walk from here,” he told the client.

The man shrugged. “Just as well,” he said, hopping out of the car. “Wouldn’t want them to see us coming.”

Geralt grunted and locked Roach, following the man up the hill. This time of night, there was no traffic to worry about running them over, at least. “How far from here is the commune?” he asked.

The musician shrugged. “I’ve only been in Posada three days,” he said. “Last man with your job was local, and he liked to chat in the afterglow. He told me about it. Said the people there are too good to spend their money in town, or something. He didn’t exactly give me a map.”

Geralt growled. “So we could be chasing after a mythical fucking commune?” he said.

The client shrugged again. “He seemed pretty convinced,” he said, just as they crested the hill. Below them, in a less-steep area hugging the mountainside, was not so much a fence as a medieval palisade, a semicircle surrounded by cleared land. Behind it were the roofs of several buildings and a terraced field.

“Ha!” the client said, in a voice louder than it should be. “Mythical my ass.”

“Keep your voice down,” Geralt hissed. He’d watched enough documentaries to know how sound carried through hills. But it was too late. The crack of a gunshot echoed through the evening air.

“Shit!” the client hissed, and turned to run. His foot slid out from under him on the rocky scree, and he went tumbling headfirst down the hill, headed straight for the armed compound. Geralt made a grab for him - he still had to get fucking paid - and the man pulled him down with him. Next he knew, they were both headed straight for a lump of rock, and then he knew no more.

When Geralt woke up, his head throbbed, but someone had mopped up the blood and put butterfly bandages on it. That was less reassuring than it could have been, considering he was tied up back to back with someone he was pretty sure was the client. He couldn’t quite focus on the dark room they were in, but he thought it might have been a root cellar. When he turned his head to look around, his vision swam, and he groaned. Behind him, the client stirred.

“You’re awake,” a man’s hoarse voice said, and Geralt still couldn’t focus on his face. “That was supposed to be a warning shot to scare you off.”

“Well, it certainly scared me,” the client said. “Scared my feet right out from under me, if you must know. Oh, my head. I must say, I’ve woken up with my head throbbing and my wrists tied before, but usually I remember consenting to that before I fell asleep.”

“Oh, really?” said another voice, a woman’s. “Is that why you’re not scared, you little thief? You should be. It’s castle doctrine in Posada, and we caught you trying to break in.”

“He’s just a stupid kid, and it was a stupid dare from the locals,” Geralt growled, not sure why he was saying it as he said it. But the kid  _ was  _ young and stupid. Maybe he could get out of this.

“And you?” the woman’s voice sneered, and she circled around to kick Geralt in the ribs. “What are you doing here?” she asked as Geralt doubled over.

“I hired him!” the client cried from behind him. “Yes, I am a thief, and I was going to rob you! With all your wealth you’re too good to spend, you surely could spare a little! But no, you take us into your home - we didn’t enter of our own free will, don’t think I didn’t note that - and bind us and beat us!”

The woman’s eyes flashed, and she did - something with the client’s head, Geralt couldn’t tell. “All my wealth, hmm?” she asked. “Come on, little thief. Let me show you something.” She cut the rope binding them together and placed a hand on each of their shoulders, shoving them up the stairs.

“Do you see the fields?” she asked. “The houses? Does that look like wealth to you?”

The crops, not that Geralt knew much about plants, didn’t look healthy up close. They were scanty and drooping. The roofs of the houses - all small - were in bad repair, a porch sagging on one, siding coming off another. The cars in the yards were all as old as Roach.

“Oh,” the client said, sounding subdued.

“Yes, oh,” their captor said, a sneer in her voice. “And you were going to steal from that?”

“The locals said -” the client tried, his voice quavering. Geralt took the opportunity he was presented, and jerked his head backwards with force. He turned around to face their captor, who now had blood streaming from her nose, and grabbed the client’s arm. Before they could run, though, the woman, still staggering, held a gun to them both with the hand not clutched to her face. They both froze.

“I said,” she told them, voice deadly still, “that we could do whatever we wanted to you.” The client took in a shaky breath under Geralt’s hand.

“Toruviel,” came a male voice, scolding. “We weren’t going to kill anyone.”

“They broke in to steal from us, Filavandrel,” the woman - Toruviel - called back, angry. “We have nothing and they wanted to take from us.”

“We’re not from here,” Geralt said, voice firm. “We didn’t know. Let us go and this never happened.”

Toruviel snarled. “Why should I let you go?” she asked, even as a blond man rounded behind her to try and push her hand down. “We have to steal just to survive. Why shouldn’t we make an example of what happens when you try that?”

“I can - I can give you a better target,” the client spoke up, his voice shaking. “My father is the senior senator for Redania -”

“Oh, and you think Daddy can buy your way out of this?” Toruviel spat at them, training the gun directly on the musician.

The man laughed, a little strained. “He wouldn’t piss on me if I was on fire - but I still have a key to his house in Redania, and the code to the safe. His schedule is public. You’d get far more out of that, wouldn’t you?”

Filavandrel whispered something in the woman’s ear, and slowly, the gun lowered. “You give us the information, we let you go,” the blond said.

“I’ll give you the key now, the code when we’re off the grounds,” the client bargained, surprisingly shrewd.

“Done,” Filavandrel said, and untied the ropes.

* * *

They were halfway back to Posada before the client spoke again.

“Well, I suppose it’s just as well I’m selling one of my amps,” he said. “That was excellent, Geralt, truly excellent.”

Geralt risked looking away from the road for a moment. “What the hell are you talking about?” he asked.

“That was the most fun and the most inspiration I’ve had in ages,” the client said. “We absolutely have to meet up again. Can I pay you to take me to my next gig?”

“With what fucking money?” Geralt asked.

“The amp is worth a lot more than a hundred orens, even at a pawn shop,” the client explained. “I’ll pay tonight’s fee, plus gas and food, if you take me to Murivel.”

Geralt considered. It was probably a bad idea. But he’d get gas and food out of it for three days at least, and by then a senator’s son would be sick of his life.

“Fine,” he grunted. “But I want one night on the bed of your sharehouse first.”

“Deal,” the client said, a gleam in his blue eyes. “This is the beginning of a wonderful partnership, I just know it.”


End file.
